The present invention relates to a gas-liquid separator of the type for separating and eliminating bubbles in a working fluid in hydraulic systems or the like.
When the working fluid passes through valves, orifices or the like in a hydraulic system or the like, sudden pressure drops occur so that the air dissolved in the working fluid evolves as bubbles. When the working fluid is an oil having a high viscosity, it is difficult for bubbles to release through it so that the bubbles cause erosion and noise. Thus it is imperative to remove the bubbles from the hydraulic system.
So far the working fluid with entrained or dissolved air or bubbles is charged and left in a tank or the like so that bubbles rise to the surface and rupture into the vapor phase. Alternatively, the pressure in the tank is reduced through a vacuum pump so that the entrained and dissolved air may be removed. However, with these gas-liquid separators, it takes a long time to separate bubbles or entrained and dissolved air. In addition, the desired separation efficiency cannot be attained without the use of a considerably large tank.
In FIG. 1 is shown a prior art gas-liquid separator of the type wherein the vortex or swirling motion of the fluid is utilized for separating entrained and dissolved gases. When a rotor a is driven by a prime mover (not shown), bubbles entrained and/or evolved from the liquid which is charged through an inlet d are forced to flow toward the center through centrifugal force and trapped by bubble trapping or collecting means c so that the liquid free from bubbles may be discharged through outlets e. This system or gas-liquid separator is by far more efficient than the tank type gas-liquid separator of the type described above, but is disadvantageous in that mainly because of the provision of the rotor a the separator becomes large in size, complicated in construction and expensive to manufacture.
In view of the above, a primary object of the present invention is to provide a gas-liquid separator which can separate bubbles or gases entrained and dissolved in a fluid without the use of a vacuum pump, a prime mover for rotating a rotor or the like.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a gas-liquid separator which can separate bubbles as rapidly as they are evolved or produced, whereby the degradation of a liquid may be avoided, the service life of hydraulic devices or the like may be increased and the generation of annoying noise may be suppressed to a negligible degree.
The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent from the following description of some preferred embodiments thereof taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.